Henry Ford Innovations Supports Walgreens Developer Challenge

DETROIT — Henry Ford Health System Innovations is providing a $3,000 prize to a top mobile healthcare app as part of the Walgreens Balance Rewards App Challenge.

The competition aims to find new mobile applications that provide incentives for healthy behavior and improve disease management.

It encourages the integration of Walgreens’ Balance Rewards application program interface. This will allow users to earn Balance Rewards points for making healthy lifestyle choices. These rewards can be redeemed at participating Walgreens for merchandise, both in-store and online.

“We can no longer look at health care as something that is just conducted in a hospital setting,” says Mark Coticchia, a vice president at HFHS who also carries the title “chief innovation officer.” “To better manage the overall health of our patients, we need to start looking at ways we can engage patients every day and in the places they visit most often.”

Third-party app developers can get contest details and submit an integrated app entry by visiting the Balance Rewards App Challenge page through Nov. 28. Winners will be announced during the Walgreens session at the upcoming mHealth Summit 2014 in Washington D.C., Dec. 7-11.

HFHS Innovations aims to link the health system’s intellectual and clinical assets with best practices in technology commercialization, venture funding, product development, and corporate partnerships. Its mission is to commercialize discoveries for clinical uses in the rapidly changing world of technology and consumer health care.